A genuine Propane Puzzler
In the spirit of giving something back, I offer the following story of a weird problem my wife and I experienced on our first cold weather trip. I now know the answer and I wonder if anyone here can nail it?
We recently purchased a 2016 Coachmen Freelander 21QB in Virgina and we've been packing in as many trips as possible before the really cold New England weather shuts us down. We were caught a little by surprise when that November Polar Vortex swept down on us while we were visiting Gettysburg, VA. The nights got down to 12 degrees and our Little House was damned uncomfortable when we woke up at 2:00 am to find that the furnace had stopped working. I started preparing to go outside and do battle, but the Saintly Spouse calmed me down. Instead we threw on an extra blanket and snuggled close to get through the night.
In the morning I tried the stove to perk a pot of java and it worked fine. When I turned on the furnace it also came back to life as if nothing was wrong. Perplexed and ever the optimists, we tried to believe it was just a quirk. That still seemed plausible the next evening when the furnace obliged and kept the place cozy all evening. Early the next morning however we woke to a cold house again.
I plowed through a few hundred forum posts and youtube vids and came to the conclusion that the regulator was probably bad. Annoying in an almost new RV, but it's pretty well known that Forest River doesn't always use the highest quality components. I think the term of art is "Value Engineered." In any event I was lucky to find a nearby RV shop that had the correct replacement regulator and was willing to install it while we waited. We tested the fix by lighting up every propane appliance we had: genset, furnace, hot water, refer, even the stove and oven. Couldn't make it fail, must be all fixt. Cool beans.
No deal. Next night, on the road back to Cape Cod it got *really* cold and the furnace wouldn't even light up in the evening. Stranger yet, the stove worked fine, even the oven. The water heater lit up normally and I could hear the furnace trying to light, even getting flame but then going out. Then things got worse as even the stove top burners got really low. Finally, there was only enough gas to keep one burner barely burning.
Sheesh! New regulator, full propane tank, what the hell? I had read that propane could freeze up if there was a large volume running through the pigtail behind the regulator, so I pulled out the little electric space heater and when I held it up to the propane pigtail hose my wife reported that the stove flame immediately leapt back to normal size. We tried the furnace and voila! Too strange.
Our trip ended and I took the RV to our friendly dealer, Majors RV up in Bourne. Their "propane guy" David was out at the time but he called me back later that day and after patiently listening to the details, he nailed it in one shot.
I realize that this is a long winded story, but there are probably some expert propane folks on this forum and I thought I'd challenge you to diagnose this problem. I'm not going to provide any hints beyond the details above, but I'll check back here in a few days and see if anyone can solve this puzzler.
Cheers,
-Grouchy
We recently purchased a 2016 Coachmen Freelander 21QB in Virgina and we've been packing in as many trips as possible before the really cold New England weather shuts us down. We were caught a little by surprise when that November Polar Vortex swept down on us while we were visiting Gettysburg, VA. The nights got down to 12 degrees and our Little House was damned uncomfortable when we woke up at 2:00 am to find that the furnace had stopped working. I started preparing to go outside and do battle, but the Saintly Spouse calmed me down. Instead we threw on an extra blanket and snuggled close to get through the night.
In the morning I tried the stove to perk a pot of java and it worked fine. When I turned on the furnace it also came back to life as if nothing was wrong. Perplexed and ever the optimists, we tried to believe it was just a quirk. That still seemed plausible the next evening when the furnace obliged and kept the place cozy all evening. Early the next morning however we woke to a cold house again.
I plowed through a few hundred forum posts and youtube vids and came to the conclusion that the regulator was probably bad. Annoying in an almost new RV, but it's pretty well known that Forest River doesn't always use the highest quality components. I think the term of art is "Value Engineered." In any event I was lucky to find a nearby RV shop that had the correct replacement regulator and was willing to install it while we waited. We tested the fix by lighting up every propane appliance we had: genset, furnace, hot water, refer, even the stove and oven. Couldn't make it fail, must be all fixt. Cool beans.
No deal. Next night, on the road back to Cape Cod it got *really* cold and the furnace wouldn't even light up in the evening. Stranger yet, the stove worked fine, even the oven. The water heater lit up normally and I could hear the furnace trying to light, even getting flame but then going out. Then things got worse as even the stove top burners got really low. Finally, there was only enough gas to keep one burner barely burning.
Sheesh! New regulator, full propane tank, what the hell? I had read that propane could freeze up if there was a large volume running through the pigtail behind the regulator, so I pulled out the little electric space heater and when I held it up to the propane pigtail hose my wife reported that the stove flame immediately leapt back to normal size. We tried the furnace and voila! Too strange.
Our trip ended and I took the RV to our friendly dealer, Majors RV up in Bourne. Their "propane guy" David was out at the time but he called me back later that day and after patiently listening to the details, he nailed it in one shot.
I realize that this is a long winded story, but there are probably some expert propane folks on this forum and I thought I'd challenge you to diagnose this problem. I'm not going to provide any hints beyond the details above, but I'll check back here in a few days and see if anyone can solve this puzzler.
Cheers,
-Grouchy
